The number of single-parent-led families in Metro Toronto, however, grew by 23 percent, from approximately 95,000 in 1991 to more than 117,000 in 1996; however, almost 60 percent (more than 5,300) of the families served annually by Metro CAS were led by lone parents. By the late 1990s, Ontarians living in same-sex unions gained unprecedented social acceptance, as well as legal rights comparable to those of heterosexual common law partners.
Almost 60 percent (more than 5,300) of the families served annually by Metro CAS were led by lone parents.
A number of economic forces came to bear during this decade. There was a prolonged recession that lasted from 1990 until 1995, as well as the increasing pace of business globalization and a wave of corporate restructuring designed to meet the challenges of the free trade agreement between Canada, the United States and Mexico. All of this placed great pressure on families. Large numbers of people were put out of work as many employers either closed down their businesses or relocated elsewhere. This was particularly so in business sectors that employed low-skilled or unskilled staff, a segment of the economy where clients of CASs were most likely to be represented. Even when the economy recovered in the mid-1990s, relatively few of the newly available jobs were full-time. For many people, self-employment became an increasingly important source of income.
As unemployment climbed, so did the costs to governments as tax revenues decreased and payments of unemployment and social assistance benefits grew. Both the federal and provincial governments ran higher budgetary deficits and felt considerable pressure to cut spending wherever they could. This pressure came from economists, as well as ordinary Canadians who were becoming increasingly concerned about how governments could meet their obligations without bankrupting their treasuries.
In 1993, the government of Premier Bob Rae responded to these concerns with a public policy initiative known as the “Social Contract.” It was an attempt to avoid public-sector layoffs by cutting back the salaries of civil servants and employees of government-funded agencies such as CASs. Its principal tool was the imposition of compulsory unpaid holidays — up to twelve days a year, quickly dubbed “Rae Days” — in return for job security. At the same time, public agencies were subjected to budget cuts through the imposition of an expenditure control plan. The Social Contract was vehemently opposed by the labour movement, which saw it as implying the workers’ consent when there was none and felt that it wrongfully forced the reopening of negotiated collective agreements.
The Social Contract’s principal means of avoiding layoffs in the civil service was the imposition of compulsory unpaid holidays — up to twelve days a year, quickly dubbed “Rae Days” — in return for job security.
The federal government, meanwhile, cut spending on unemployment insurance (which it renamed employment insurance) by 40 percent, introduced a cap on the costs it shared with Ontario under the Canada Assistance Plan, and eventually replaced that plan with a less generous one, the Canada Health and Social Transfer. These events brought sizeable cuts in federal support for health and social programs, leaving the provincial government to cope as best it could.
Against this background, the provincial election of 1995 ushered in a new government, led by Premier Mike Harris, with a mandate to introduce a “common sense revolution” that promised voters large savings in their income taxes and significant cuts in government spending. The resulting sea change in the role of government in Ontario emphasized accountability, reduced layers of administration, services that were consumer-driven and organizations that were more autonomous and self-reliant.
Despite the previous two governments’ efforts to increase welfare rates as a social and economic investment in people — as recommended in 1988 by the Social Assistance Review Committee — by 1995 most recipients were still living below the poverty line. Undeterred by this scenario, one of the new government’s first acts was to reduce by almost 22 percent the amount it paid to those living on social assistance, while at the same time tightening the eligibility criteria. Since almost 60 percent of the clients of Metro CAS depended on this program for their family income, the changes caused them a disproportionate degree of hardship.
One of the new government’s first acts was to reduce by almost 22 percent the amount it paid to those living on social assistance, while at the same time tightening the eligibility criteria. Since almost 60 percent of the clients of Metro CAS depended on this program for their family income, the changes caused them a disproportionate degree of hardship.
While the caseloads of social assistance workers may have dropped as a result of the new eligibility requirements, poverty rates did not. In 1996, a total of 200,000 Metro households, almost 25 percent, had incomes of less than $20,000 a year — more than $8,000 below the poverty line for a three-person family.
By 1999, it was estimated that 37 percent of children under the age of twelve living in Metro Toronto, and more than three-quarters of the children served by Metro CAS, were poor. Food bank use soared because many parents were using more and more of their food allowances to pay for shelter. Even so, most still found it difficult to find or keep suitable housing, while poverty also created mounting health, social and educational problems for their children.
By 1999, it was estimated that 37 percent of children under the age of twelve living in Metro Toronto, and more than three-quarters of the children served by Metro CAS, were poor.
Homeless people became increasingly visible on the streets, the result of poverty and a decline in the stock of affordable housing, conditions that were worsened by the elimination of government subsidies for apartments where rents were geared to tenants’ income. In 1999, a municipal task force chaired by Anne Golden, the president of the United Way of Greater Toronto, tabled its report, Taking Responsibility for Homelessness: An Action Plan for Toronto (also known as the Golden Report). It found that, on an average night, more than 3,000 people sought refuge in shelters — and even more during periods of cold weather. Traditionally, those who relied on shelters had primarily been single men, but the Golden Report revealed that youth under eighteen years of age and families with children were now the fastest-growing groups of users of emergency accommodation.
In past years, those who relied on shelters had primarily been single men, but the Golden Report revealed that youth under eighteen years of age and families with children were now the fastest-growing groups of users of emergency accommodation.
Meanwhile, the Harris government required Metro CAS and other social service agencies to reduce their base budgets by 5 percent; some organizations had to absorb even larger cuts, while funding for others was eliminated entirely, forcing them to reduce their services drastically, to amalgamate or to close their doors.
Family breakdown, social problems and community dislocation were direct consequences of these policy changes. Increasingly, families were left to their own devices and were exposed to the vagaries of the market economy. This erosion of the welfare state seemed to have wiped out the effects of more than fifty years of progressive social reform aimed at improving the lives of Torontonians and other Ontarians.
Bruce Rivers
Jim Patterson, who was board president in 1988, recalls the priorities the board set in seeking a new chief executive:
We wanted someone who really understood Ontario child welfare, who had their roots in the system, for whom running the agency would be a passion and not just a job. He or she had to be capable, able to work with staff, foster parents, the government, the press, with everyone regardless of their political stripe, regardless of whether they were union people or senior managers. We got that person when we hired Bruce Rivers.
In September 1988, Bruce Rivers assumed responsibility for directing what, by that time, had become the largest board-operated child welfare agency in North America. Metro CAS had an annual budget of more than $50 million, a staff of 700, four hundred foster homes and 1,000 volunteers. Rivers had worked almost exclusively at Metro CAS since earning his MSW degree in 1976, fi
rst as a frontline worker and then in a series of management positions of increasing responsibility. For the three years before he became the society’s executive director, he had been the director of service at Metro’s Catholic CAS.
The board’s appointment of Rivers to the top job at Metro CAS was strongly supported by the agency’s staff and by foster parents, with whom he had earned significant credibility during his years as a worker and manager. They recognized him as a good administrator, found him personable and approachable and knew he was a person who cared about people and who put the needs of children first.
The board’s appointment of Bruce Rivers to the top job at Metro CAS was strongly supported by the agency’s staff and by foster parents, with whom he had earned significant credibility during his years as a worker and manager.
Metro CAS in the Nineties
As described in Chapter 7, a number of events during the 1980s caused the relationship between Metro CAS and MCSS, the agency’s principal funder, to deteriorate. At the same time, there had been much debate within the society about the direction the agency should be taking, both to meet the needs of children and families and to provide staff with necessary resources and good working conditions, in lean economic times. One of Bruce Rivers’ first initiatives as executive director — with the support of the board under presidents Barry Brace and Chris Stringer — was to address these issues by developing a vision for Metro CAS in the 1990s.
In 1989, a review of the society’s operations had been jointly undertaken with MCSS, and it outlined the agency’s strengths while identifying areas that required further work. Meanwhile, the society had received a certificate of accreditation from the Council on Accreditation, a body sponsored by 540 North American family service agencies. This endorsement confirmed that the agency was conducting its operations effectively and managing its funds wisely. The validation the society received from these two reviews demonstrated that the agency was able to weather difficult times, such as those it had experienced during the recent past, while maintaining high standards.
The validation the society received from a pair of reviews of its work demonstrated that the agency was able to weather difficult times, such as those it had experienced during the recent past, while maintaining high standards.
With its faith renewed in its historical values of sound management, innovative programming and dedicated staff, foster parents and volunteers, the society went about developing a vision to guide its operations over the succeeding five years. The process was based on building consensus among children in care, families served by the agency, staff, foster parents, volunteers, board members, funders and community organizations.
With its faith renewed in its historical values of sound management, innovative programming and dedicated staff, foster parents and volunteers, the society went about developing a vision to guide its operations over the succeeding five years.
The outcome was the long-range plan of 1990, which comprised new mission and values statements as well as five long-range goals that were to be used as a framework for both strategic planning and day-to-day activities. At the same time, a new code of ethics to govern the actions of board members, staff, foster parents and volunteers was introduced.
The new mission statement committed the society to protecting children from emotional, sexual and physical harm by working with individual children and their families in the community; providing a high standard and continuity of substitute parental care and relationships for those children who cannot remain at home; and developing, in partnership with others, prevention programs that encourage healthy and positive relationships among children and families in the community. All this was to be undertaken in a climate of dignity, integrity and respect for individual differences.
The values statement addressed the primacy of the child’s needs above all other considerations; continuity of care for children in both service and placement; supportive teamwork and partnership, recognizing the contribution of all who provide and support service to children and families; and leadership and advocacy in developing solutions to child welfare issues.
The five long-range goals included clarifying the society’s prevention and preventive roles; developing and implementing strategies that supported a positive work environment; responding to complex issues that affected service delivery, notably more proactive race relations; resolving funding issues; and developing effective relations between the society, governments and the broader community.
Board members, management and front-line staff, foster parents and volunteers all worked hard to implement the new mission and values statements and the longrange goals. Some examples of their achievements are described below.
Funding and service challenges of the early 1990s
At the beginning of the 1990s, as the economic climate worsened, Metro CAS became increasingly concerned about the erosion of its capacity to serve children and families adequately. Despite an accumulated deficit of almost $2.5 million, demands for the agency to expand its services were increasing due to the recession and the growing complexity and urgency of the problems experienced by many families.
Despite an accumulated deficit of almost $2.5 million, demands for the agency to expand its services were increasing due to the recession and the growing complexity and urgency of the problems experienced by many families.
Eighty-three percent of those served by the society lived at or below the poverty line, an indicator of the stress that economic disadvantage placed on family life, compromising parenting ability and increasing the risk to children. A lack of adequate housing was a factor in 18 percent of the situations that led to the admission of a child to the agency’s care. While frequent cocaine use was reported in less than one percent of Metro Toronto’s population, approximately 12 percent of families who came to the society’s attention were harmed in some way by the abuse of this drug. Violence in the community, and within families, was growing steadily, with child abuse a feature in the lives of more than one-third of the families receiving agency services.
Workers were becoming concerned not only about the conditions under which many of their clients had to live but also about their own high caseloads and their personal safety in the community. A typical worker handled a caseload of twenty-six to thirty, while some were responsible for even more. Threatened and actual assaults to workers as they went about their day-to-day tasks were not uncommon. These issues would often leave staff anxious and overwhelmed, causing them to suffer personal stress and increasing the risk of burnout and high employee turnover. At the same time, the increasing size and diversity of Metro Toronto’s many racial, ethnic and cultural communities added to the pressure for knowledgeable workers and specific programming to meet their specialized needs.
In the face of these challenges, the board and staff worked to make the best use of limited resources, although not without concern that program reductions in response to financial restraint would affect the scope of services the society was able to offer. Concurrent with these efforts, therefore, the agency embarked on an advocacy campaign — organized by Sharron Richards, its child welfare advocate — based on the belief that services to children and families needed to receive first call on government resources.
The agency embarked on an advocacy campaign based on the belief that services to children and families needed to receive first call on government resources.
Politicians and MCSS staff were lobbied, not only by executive director Bruce Rivers and board president Bob Witterick, but also by Steve Lowden, a board member of the CAS Foundation; Askari Hussein, a youth in care; foster parent Sheila Dowdall; and Gina Gignac, the president of CUPE Local 2316, representing the society’s unionized employees. They spoke of the challenges they faced daily — poverty, homelessness, substance abuse, family violence, child abuse — and the increased difficulty and expense of finding suitable placements for children in the agency’s care, one-third of whom had to be placed in beds outside Metro Toront
o because suitable homes could not be found for them in the city.
They also proposed solutions that, through a more creative and flexible use of funding, would allow for both an expansion of foster care as well as a greater emphasis on early intervention and family preservation programs. Such programs would enable children to remain with their families while the agency worked with them to solve their problems.
The campaign was a novel one for a social service organization at that time in that it involved key government, political and business leaders. Although it did not result in the provision of additional resources, it did lead to the development of a new funding formula that offered CASs across the province the chance to refocus their programs to better meet the needs of the children and families they were serving.
Not long afterward, however, the society was subjected to the government’s expenditure control plan under the so-called Social Contract described at the beginning of this chapter. Under this plan the agency was required to cut its annual spending — which then amounted to more than $70 million — by $1.5 million a year over three years. The theme was not new, but coming on the heels of several years of fiscal restraint, the level of desperation it created in the face of increasing service needs was considerable.
The society was, however, able to weather the tough times through exceptional leadership and the collective dedication of its committed board members, staff, foster parents and volunteers.
Tony Quan, the society’s director of finance and administration, and his team of accountants battled incredibly long odds to balance the agency’s budget while providing staff with information about the organization’s financial situation. This contrasted sharply with previous eras, as Sybil Smith recalls:
Staff today are very much aware of issues with the province, with the agency’s budget, because Bruce [Rivers], Carolyn [Buck] and Tony [Quan] made sure that there was a flow of information and consultation with staff about these issues. This contrasts sharply with thirty years ago, when we as workers came in and did our jobs as best we could, in good times or bad, but without the slightest idea of what the challenges were in running the agency or what the budget was or how the money was spent.
A Legacy of Caring Page 28